Obesity is one of the most common medical disorders and affects about 30-40% of the population of the United States, 10% of which may be severe and morbid. Complications of obesity include insulin resistance, diabetes mellitus (and its complications, including oxidative stress), hypertension, cardiovascular disease, hyperlipidemia, sleep apnea, cancer, pulmonary hypertension, cholecystitis, and osteoarthritis are major reasons for medical intervention. The mortality from obesity is estimated at 300,000 to 400,000 per annum in the United States. The exact etiology of obesity is unknown but occurs when energy intake exceeds energy expenditure.
One main contributing factor in obesity is overeating, which results in an excess of energy being consumed in relation to the amount of energy expended by an individual. The excess energy is then stored largely as fat. An individual's body weight is essentially governed by the net effect of energy consumed versus energy expended. Daily energy expenditure consists of three components: basal metabolic rate, adaptive thermogenesis and physical activity. All of the aforementioned components must be in a balance of energy expenditure in an individual with energy or food intake so that an individual does not gain nor lose body weight. Therefore, for that person to lose body weight from a reduction in adipose tissue, more energy must be expended by the individual than taken into the body.
Losing weight and keeping it off is very difficult for most individuals. Weight gain results when an individual's caloric intake exceeds the number of calories expended as energy. In attempting to lose weight, an individual may utilize a regimen of caloric deficit (i.e. decreasing caloric intake so that calories expended as energy exceed caloric intake). Generally, the result is an adaptive response of a lowered basal (resting) metabolic rate. Caloric deficit can also cause a loss of skeletal muscle. Thus, weight loss or reducing caloric intake results in a lowering of resting energy expenditure and loss of lean body mass. This makes it harder to keep the weight off once the individual has attained his desired weight goal.
When the body encounters an energy deficit in the course of weight-reducing diets, it tends to save energy by reducing thermogenesis. This factor contributes to a failure in sustaining body weight after body weight loss. These circumstances require continually stimulated thermogenesis. After losing weight for a short duration, an individual's weight stabilizes. In order to maintain body weight there is a need to control food intake, stimulate thermogenesis and increase energy levels on an ongoing basis.
Some undesired effects encountered by individuals desiring to loss weight include fatigue, low energy, and a lack of motivation and/or depression.
Another undesired effect of increased accumulation of body fat is an increased oxidative stress through the generation of reactive oxygen species and the downregulation of antioxidative enzymes. This downregulation of antioxidative enzymes can contribute to the pathogenesis of diabetes, hypertension and atherosclerosis. Thus it is desirable to provide an individual means to reduce stored body fat and simultaneously offer protection from reactive oxygen species.
Increased oxidative stress due to increased body fat is thought to be an early contributor to hypertension, coronary heart disease, type 2 diabetes mellitus, stroke and even some forms of cancer and is therefore an attractive target strategy for combating the negative effects of excessive body fat while aiming to reduce the volume of stored body fat in an individual.
With the unprecedented rise in obesity throughout the world, there exists both a need and want from individuals for improved aids, methods and interventions directed to reducing body fat and maintaining lowered levels of body fat, while also supplying beneficial antioxidant activity.
While not necessarily obese, many individuals who are overweight can also suffer from many similar conditions known to be associated with obesity including, among others, poor self-esteem and low self-confidence, poor dietary and exercise habits, lack of energy and anxiety. Many of these individuals would benefit from the prevention or correction some of these conditions if they were able to prevent weight gain and/or maintain a normal body weight.
Therefore, there is a need to provide individuals compositions useful for increasing energy and promoting weight loss, for the treatment of obesity, prevention of weight gain or maintenance of normal body weight and increasing energy.